10 Dec 2012

Helping the Homeless

You don't have to
walk very far in Paris
to catch a man rummaging through leftovers in a bin, a kid fumbling for coins
on the street side, or a crippled woman sitting in a tunnel with nothing but a
used coffee cup to collect loose change, her face full of flagrant
desperation. The same words are repeated day in, day out. They need
food, a restaurant ticket, money, anything to keep them alive. They sell
magazines that no-one wants to read. The metro smells of piss and sweat but it's
the only place for them to keep warm in winter months before the last train
departs and they're forced to leave. Living in Paris is so ridiculously expensive that I'm
not surprised so many people have taken to begging as their only source of
income.

Roma (gypsies) hold
malnourished children over their arms as they crawl through the metro with one
hand hanging limply to collect money. They have the notorious reputation
of being thieves and under Sarkozy's government a large number of illegal
immigrants were repatriated in 2010 which spurred on accusations of France's
racism. Many of these Roma live in camps scattered across France in urban
settlements lacking secure or sanitary conditions. Their situation is
dire. According to Sarkozy, these camps are sources of crime,
prostitution, trafficking and child exploitation which is why he wanted to put a stop to it.

Being part of the EU
means that Bulgarian and Romanian citizens have the right to come to France without a visa, but French immigration
laws require them to have work or residency permits if they want to spend more
than three months in France.
Understandably, these permits are difficult to obtain which means many Roma are
forced to either return home, or stay in France illegally in unliveable circumstances.

It's far too easy to
become desensitized; to walk past a homeless person with your iPod headphones in, on the
way to a cafe where you proceed to spend extravagant amounts on coffee and
cake. A coffee in Starbucks will cost you €4, while a baguette can be as
little as 80 cents and could cure a child's hunger, be it temporarily.

The other day I saw
a man clinging onto a bar, sobbing. The pain in his eyes was unbearable
and his uncontrollable tears were heart wrenching. Person after person
walked past him, unwilling to be the Good Samaritan. And I did the
same.

Luke 3:10-11 : And the crowds asked him, “What then shall we do?” And he answered
them, “Whoever has two tunics is to share with him who has none, and
whoever has food is to do likewise.”